EPISODE 001

Special Note: If you have not yet read the Prelude to the actual gameplay adventure, you can do so by clicking here before continuing to read the Episode 01 Recap below. It may help bring the story into context.

Digsy Longtoe was beginning to wear a path in the soft dirt floor of the pit as he paced back and forth, carefully considering his options. The little raider, small for even a swamp gobber, was not particularly fond of deep pits, especially those he was trapped at the bottom of. To make matters worse, his arms ached. He certainly wasn’t about to let any of his companions know, lest they think he was weak and not worthy of being on this expedition; but helping to carry the massive form of Sobek the Gatorman out of the light of the pit’s mouth had strained him more than he would have imagined. In truth, Tingy was also more than a little scared, and muttered to himself to focus on the bigger problem at hand; getting out of this hole of eventual death. After a bit more thought he glanced back at his companions, and seeing them all continuing to inspect Sobek’s injuries, Tingy furrowed his brow with a determined mind and pulled out his grappling gun. Quickly inspecting it for any type of damage it may have sustained after his clumsy fall into the pit trap, he aimed the small grapple hook just above the lip of the hole. Another chance to be a hero, he thought to himself as he smiled and put his finger on the trigger. Surely his grapple would catch something solid, like a tree trunk or a large rock, and the little gobber would scurry up the dirt wall as quick as you please and suss out some ingenious way to rescue all his companions from certain death by dehydration. Ahhh, the glory of Gobber ingenuity in the development of such marvelous devices such as this extraordinary grappler.

Tingy squeezed the trigger and closed his eyes, just in case the pistol glitched and blew up in his face. Gobber devices, especially those constructed by him, had a tendency to backfire in an unexpected and often startling way when he needed them to work most. “PING!” came the sound of the mechanism releasing, and up flew the grapple over the lip of the hole just as he aimed it. I knew it would work, Tingy thought to himself, and heard the metal hook land and hopefully attach to something solid. Giving it a slight tug, there was indeed some resistance from above. This was working out perfectly. Tingy turned confidently to his friends and proudly made his announcement. “Tingy worked things out. I gets grapple hook held up top. I climb out and find way to gets everyone outs.” Before the rest of his companions could shower him with praise, Tingy seized what he viewed as a very heroic moment and began his triumphant ascent. Unfortunately for the little tinker, that’s when the grand plan fell apart. As Tingy put more serious weight on the rope, it became apparent that his hook had found purchase alright; just not on a tree or a rock. The grappling hook gave way immediately as his full weight strained the chord, and Tingy could only stare frozen as small rocks, dirt, tree branches, and lint moss mixed with the dung of some forest creature came raining down on top of his head. He tried to dive out of the way, but waited just a split second too long and ended up covered in filth. Visibly shaken by the entire ordeal, Tingy ran to Lilith Duskwood and cowered behind her in shame. His victorious, heroic moment did not go how he expected one bit; surely to be recorded as another entry in Yetu’s stupid log book.

With a harrumph, Yetu removed the pickaxe from his pack and moved to the far end of the pit. “Will you guys stop messing around; this is serious,” the pygmy troll said and began to tunnel upward at what he determined was a 45 degree angle toward what he remembered was a clear path to the ground above. It didn’t take long for the highly efficient burrower to make some notable progress, and both Lilith and Graag helped remove dirt from the tunnel as Yetu dug. Tingy resigned himself to monitor Sobek’s health, as the three big people worked on the escape route, cleaning the mud and moss off himself as he did so.

As time continued to pass, probably close to an hour or so, Graag nervously switched back and forth between clearing the ever growing mound of dirt Yetu was generating, and staring up at the pit’s mouth, half expecting something sinister and hungry to appear and devour them all. To the Tharn’s relief, the forest above seemed to return to normal, the signs and sounds of whatever was chasing their warband completely gone. It wasn’t long after this that Sobek the Chieftain began to stir and finally wake. Groaning loudly, Sobek struggled to sit up and immediately noticed two things. First, he was overwhelmingly sore from head to toe. His entire body ached, including his tail. Second, he was stiff as a board and literally covered from head to toe in gauze and bandages. “What in the hells?!?” he barked. “Lilith, did you do this to me?”

The young woman smiled as she saw her friend regain consciousness and shook her head with a grin. “Don’t look at me,” she laughed, pointing to their little gobber friend who was so excited to see the giant gatorman back on his feet he could hardly contain himself, his own troubles whisked away. The little raider ran up to Sobek with such enthusiasm, he accidentally kicked his leg, causing the gatorman to wince. “Tingy fix you! Tingy fix you! You was broken from the fall Sobek, and Tingy fix you right up!”

Sobek put his back against a pit wall to look around and gave the tinker a wink with his one good eye. The Bokor liked the little gobber quite a bit. He didn’t find him particularly useful for anything yet, but he certainly respected Tingy’s never-ending desire to try to help in every situation that came up. It was an admirable quality that Sobek found endearing, if a bit troublesome from time to time. “Do you think you could find my backpack, little one? I am famished!”

As Tingy ran to the pack of meat that Sobek kept his farrow leftovers in, the gobber was met by a waiting Lilith, who snatched the bag up and handed the little swamper only one smallish piece of meat. “That’s all you get for now,” the woman said matter of factly. “As of this moment, I am going to start monitoring just how much food you inhale,” she said. “We wouldn’t be in this situation if you had better dexterity and didn’t knock us over like a runaway heard of cow.”

“The hells you are!” Sobek responded obstinately. “We would not be in this situation if you didn’t push me the way you did. ‘Move faster, Sobek! Keep running faster!’ the gatorman imitated Lilith’s voice as he looked at her. “You push me as if I was built like you, when clearly I am not. Frankly, this is as much if not more your fault than my own,” Sobek justified with an insistent nod as he devoured the piece of farrow meat with one huge bite, licking his enormous snout afterward.

As the two friends continued to bicker back and forth like a father and daughter might, Yetu let out a whistle from above them, deep within the tunnel he had created. “Wart, hand me my lantern, please,” the Pyg instructed his little whelp companion. “I broke through, but from what little I can tell, not to the surface. I need to see where in the name of the Earthmother I am.” As Wart scurried out of his little satchel, he unhooked the small gaslight lantern from Yetu’s belt and gave it a spark. The lantern lit up brilliantly on the first try, as Yetu was rather meticulous about keeping his equipment in working order. “Well, well, well,” the scout said with wide eyes. “And what exactly do we have here…”

A few more minutes passed when Yetu appeared from his extremely wide tunnel, his dirt covered hat sitting crooked on the top of his mostly bald head. “Not sure what the lot of you are waiting for? Tunnel’s clear and found a way out. Time to go!”

“You dug all the way to the surface that quickly?” Lilith responded with more than a bit of surprise in her voice. She knew Yetu was an accomplished burrower, but that was fast.

“Well… not exactly,” Yetu answered. “Dug about 70 feet or so as far as I can guess. Ran into a tunnel system of some kind, but it’s not natural. My guess is some kind of small chamber network. Thought I heard water dripping from somewhere, which might be a good sign seein’ how are supply is low. No tracks either, as far as I can tell from cursory inspection. Probably safe, but we should be on our guard just in case. Follow me.”As Yetu disappeared up the pitched tunnel, Graag heard what sounded like voices at the top of the pit mouth. Perfect time to get out of this hole and move on. Giving a hand signal to the party, they moved out of the pit and up the tunnel one by one. Lilith, Tingy, and Sobek moving as quietly as they could, and Graag bringing up the rear. As the party reached the top of Yetu’s tunnel, Graag mentioned to the stocky Bushwacker that it may be a smart idea to collapse the tunnel behind them, just in case. "You never know when some idiot will come along and try to climb down a pit trap because they're curious," he said sarcastically. “Aye, I was already thinking that myself. Let me see what I can do,” Yetu nodded and disappeared down the tunnel yet again. No more than a minute later the Pyg returned and simply stated it was done. As a team, the warband began scanning the underground cave for signs of danger. While Lilith checked methodically for various types of tracks, Graag moved forward slightly and tried to detect any sense of unusual odors. Meanwhile, Yetu and Wart searched the immediate area for hidden dangers like traps or sinkholes. None of the investigators came up with a positive finding, and the group decided it was probably safe to press on. Lantern out to illuminate the otherwise dark corridors, Yetu moved to the front and saw a room to his left, a wide hallway to his right, and a narrow passageway directly in front. “Might as well check everything,” the Scout said as he moved into the room to the left, noticing immediately what were obvious markings on the walls. Pygmy Trolls, contrary to popular belief in the wilds, were often avid learners. Unlike their stronger and more aggressive cousins, the Trollkin, Pygs appreciated the value of knowledge, especially as it related to various types of lore. Indeed, Yetu and his tribe credit in no small part their continued existence in the harsh wilds of The Gnarls to their understanding of some of the old ways, and the value it brought to the Trollkin tribes they associated with. It was this very knowledge that allowed him to immediately recognize the strange writing as Molgur-Tharn runes. Unfortunately, that is where Yetu’s abilities ceased to be helpful. Being able to discern what they were, and actually read what they said, were two entirely different things.

“Graag!” the Pyg called. “I need you to look at something in here please.”

The towering Tharn brigand entered the room confidently and followed Yetu’s pointing finger to the writing etched into the cave walls. Using the lantern to get a better look, Graag spent nearly five minutes scanning and re-scanning the various symbols. When he was done, he turned to Yetu and simply said, “These runes are very old. I would even say ‘ancient’ is a better word. They are very difficult to interpret, as most of them are as foreign to me as they probably are to you. That being said, I can unerringly make out three words for sure. DANGER. DEMON. BAT. Beyond that, your guess is as good as mine.” And with that done, Graag moved out to the large passageway toward the right and looked around the corner. It was so dark, the Tharn saw next to nothing and moved back toward the group with no further comment.

Meanwhile, Tingy and Lilith moved back toward Yetu’s escape tunnel and listened at the makeshift wall the burrower had created to block off his passageway from would-be pursuers. Neither of them heard signs of anything on the other side. “It’s doubtful anyone had any desire to descend into a pit trap, even if they did hear Yetu collapse the tunnel. I think we are safe from that direction at least,” the Human said. Tingy just nodded in agreement, not really having anything to add to the woman’s assessment.

Back in the main hall, their sites now set on the narrow passageway directly in front of them, the group discussed that being the next place to move to. “Sobek, you stay behind and guard the entrance to this passageway. You are much too large to risk getting stuck while traversing through,” Yetu suggested. This was Yetu's polite way of pointing out that Sobek was as fat as a jellyslug, and he didn't much appreciate it.

Sobek glared down at the Pygmy Troll and spoke. “Petsuchos would never speak to me that way you know,” the Gatorman said, referring to his dead brother that the Bokor believed had been reincarnated into the soul of Yetu. Gatormen beliefs when it came to death and the transcendence of the spirit were a bit eccentric compared to the other races of the wilds, and Sobek’s personal theories were even more radical than most. He had shared his deepest beliefs with Yetu before, which not only made the Pyg uncomfortable, but downright disturbed him at times.

“Good thing I am not him, then!” Yetu retorted to the Bokor’s statement, wanting to change the creepy subject immediately, and took the lead into the small passageway which led to the dripping water sound.“But you are; you just don’t know it yet,” Sobek whispered more to himself than anyone, and immediately followed the Pyg into the narrow tunnel, doing his best to squeeze his portly frame past the jagged walls.

As the two moved through the hall, the rest of the party decided to stay back in the main chamber just in case. Lilith in particular, not fond of the idea of getting stuck in the narrow passageway should something hostile show up unexpected, was more than happy to protect their flank. Graag, adverse to cramped conditions due to his size, stayed with Lilith and continued to smell the air for anything out of the ordinary. Tingy, as usual, stayed within arm’s reach of Lilith, his fear of both deep caves and water causing him no ends of anxiety. “Have you ever heard of any creature such as a demon bat,” the Tharn asked the monster hunter after a few minutes.

“Not specifically,” Lilith replied. Being the group’s expert on wild creatures, especially those of the non-common variety, the woman was often queried by her companions as to the nature of certain beasts. “Without seeing one directly, those runes could be referring to more than a few dozen types of creatures that I’m aware of; and there are probably a few dozen types beyond those that I’ve never heard of.”

Back in the passageway, Yetu raised his hand to signal Sobek to stop moving. The sound of dripping water was becoming louder, and the scout was certain it was coming from up ahead. Then, just as he signaled to resume their walk, a loud chirp-like noise drowned the hallway where the two adventurers stood. Looking back at Sobek with a concerned eye, it immediately became obvious that the companions were not alone in the caverns. That was unmistakably the sound of a living creature. Giving Sobek a knowing nod, Yetu stuck his hand out into the air. “Wart. Hand me my club.” As if on cue, the little Whelp who had been perched curiously on Yetu’s shoulder for the past several minutes, scurried down to the scout’s waist and unclipped the wooden club from his master’s belt, looking around one more time before creaping down as deep as possible into Yetu’s backpack, hiding from whatever was about to happen next.